missions conference

We made some new friends while visiting our old stomping grounds at the Ligonier National Conference in Orlando (No more stocking the book store tables).

After a busy travel schedule since the beginning of the year, we are home for a while. We’ve been to Maryland, Virginia, Georgia (multiple times), Alabama, and every corner of Florida. We are coming off the road, but we are not resting. There is a lot of following up, re calibrating, and planning our next steps. Pray for wisdom for us.

Back, Forth, and Onward
Our journey has been challenging to say the least, especially with our change of field. Because of that, our budget was increased, and we have lost some significant support due to the economy, which moved us backwards. We are still past the half-way point, but we have slipped behind a few percentage points.

But the Lord is in control, and we are in forward motion again. We are really praying to be 100% by August. We want to be serving in Mokahum by the fall semester. We need 80% by July before we get to Belgium. This is an impossible thing to pray for, but we serve a God who specializes in things thought impossible. Will you pray with us?

Here we are with Dr. Richard Pratt and Rob Griffith of Third Millennium Ministries. Dr. Pratt was the keynote speaker at Carriage Lane Presbyterian Church’s annual missions conference. Currently we are working on a special project for Native America together. I will let you know when it is finished.

What do we need?
We need a bigger support team. We need more churches to visit and more people to meet. We need your prayers, but more importantly, we need the answers to those prayers. A significant part of those answers is in the form of pledged support. Without those pledges we don’t get to the field. If you have already given us a special gift, or if you give regularly but have notified us that you plan to continue giving, please consider making an actual pledge. This is essential to our departure.

Will you pray for us?
1. We need a bigger support team. If all our friends gave just $30 per month, we would be packing our bags tomorrow. That is one dollar a day. We are praying for pledges of all kinds: $5, $25, $50, $100, $200, and $400 per month for at least a four-year commitment.

2. Pray for yourself. If you would like to give, but don’t think you can, ask the Lord to make it possible. Are you bold enough? Scripture encourages you to pray that way (Heb 4:16, 10:19). Go for it.

3. Pray for our perseverance as well. It has been a long road so far and there is more to go.

4. Pray for a special project we are working on with Third Millennium

Here is Regina ready to teach the children at Orangewood Presbyterian Church’s missions conference. Regina taught the children to sing Amazing Grace in Cherokee playing a ukulele. You should have seen the children how they reverently sang such a beautiful song in such a beautiful language. They actually requested to sing it again — and we did.

Ministries. We are very excited about it.

Thank you for taking time to read this. The Lord bless you.

This is a picture of us while visiting the Mokahum Ministry Center near Bemidji, MN. We are still residing in Florida, but we are striving to get there to serve. Please prayerfully consider joining our team.

Cold Morning
I remember walking into a church voluntarily for the first time when I was twenty years old. It was a very snowy February morning in New England. At that time I was anxiously searching for significance as a bass player in a heavy metal band. My life was a wreck in every direction. After reading the Bible for about a week or so, I decided that I should go to church. So I put on my best Jimi Hendrix t-shirt and black skinny jeans and headed off to church in my girlfriend’s car. The snow came down fast and hard. Unable get up the long steep driveway, I just slid backwards off to the side, put the car in park, and trudged up the hill on foot.

Warm Welcome
Already late, I was cheerfully met by a man who eagerly introduced himself with a smile and handshake. “Hi, I’m Marc,” he said, “Welcome.” The congregation was already singing as Marc found me a seat. The music was robust, beautiful, and joyful. As I was getting my bearings in this foreign environment, I looked over to the man playing the piano singing with all his heart. He glanced over my way and give me a warm welcoming smile. He seemed to know what the wind just blew in.

When the singing concluded, the man at the piano made his way to the pulpit. To my surprise, he was the preacher, too. There was one very impressed bass player in the congregation that morning. This was my first introduction to Rev. Carl Guiney. I later would call him pastor.

Mission: Woonsocket, RI
I could write pages and pages on Pastor Guiney’s impact on my life, which I intend to do, but for now, I want to highlight his influence on me regarding missions. Pastor Guiney had a heart for missions and it was contagious. He planted that church where he wholly gave himself to until the day the Lord took him home. That was no small task in a small New England city chock full of Catholic churches. Fresh out of Bible college, he drove from Indiana and went to Woonsocket, RI. He took different jobs to support himself and held Bible studies until a nucleus was developed and a church was born. He didn’t apply and wait for a job as a pastor; he simply planted a church where one was desperately needed. He tied himself to the mast and committed himself to serving the people of Woonsocket.

Mission: Native America
At our church we didn’t have to wait for an annual missions conference to meet missionaries. Pastor Guiney had them coming through the church all the time. I was always excited to hear what the Lord was doing throughout the world. He had them speak either Sunday morning or evening services or Thursday night Bible study. One particular missionary really got my attention as he talked about life on an Indian reservation. His name was Joe – “Injun Joe” as his Native friends dubbed him. He was actually Italian, but his heart was for Native America. He awakened me to the need in Native America. I would love to be able to say that it was that night I decided to become a missionary to Native America – that would make a really great story – but that is not what happened. I can tell you that it was because of that particular missionary and Pastor Guiney’s passion for missions that I am a missionary today.

Sacrifice
During those years, First Assembly of God in Woonsocket struggled to pay the mortgage, and sometimes even the pastor. Yet Pastor Guiney was committed to missions. Some churches would never think of giving only $25 a month to a missionary. How would that look? Always willing to give more, First Assembly was not too proud to give a little. Pastor Guiney was not concerned with appearances in that regard. He simply wanted the name of Jesus exalted among the nations.

A Reflection
To my Reformed brothers and sisters, yes, I ultimately left Assemblies of God to pursue my studies in Reformed theology. Leaving that church was one of the most painful decisions I ever made. I am a confessional Calvinist just as much as the the next guy, but I must confess that I am starting to feel a chill, only this time it is not coming from outside. Yet my heart is warmed when I think of the day when I was welcomed by Pastor Guiney’s smiling eyes (yes, he was Irish). I am grateful to the Lord for his life example of sacrifice and faithfulness. He taught me to endure and wait upon the Lord – a lesson I need to learn again and again.

When the Apostle Paul set out on his missionary journeys, he desired to preach the gospel to all who have not heard the good news of the Kingdom, which at that time, the whole world was a fresh mission field. In Romans 15:20, Paul says, “I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named, lest I build on someone else’s foundation.” He wanted to go where nobody had yet been.

Recently I heard of two missionaries attending a missions conference where one missionary proclaimed his ministry to his country was more important than missions to Native America because his mission was to an unreached people group whereas Native America has already been reached. Essentially, using Romans 15:20 as a proof text, he declared that only missions to unreached people groups matter, or at least are superior to all other missionary endeavors.

There seems to be confusion out there concerning how we are to approach our missionary endeavors. Some have taken Paul’s desire to be the missions template. In order to conclude that, we need to ask some important questions. Do the words in Romans 15:20 represent Paul’s personal ambition for himself as a minister of the gospel, or is Paul issuing a command for all who wish to engage in missionary activities? Is it biblical to have missionaries go to where others have gone before? Tradition tells us that the Apostle Thomas went to India. Do we not go to India anymore? Once a missionary establishes a church, does that mean the entire people group is considered evangelized with no further need for additional gospel laborers? How many generations must pass and how empty do churches have to be before another missionary attempts to plant a church that preaches and teaches the gospel of grace?

Although it is true that much of Native America has has been the target of missionaries over the last 500 hundred years, it would be a failure on our part to check them off on our list of “reached” people. Are we considering each of the 566 recognized tribes, (nations) or did we lump them altogether as one people with no recognition of their own identities?

Without question, many Native Americans have been reached, but history has shown that many of the problems we face today in ministry are the result of our past mission strategies. One particular guiding principle is expressed in the old adage “Kill the Indian, save the man.” That has led to the cultural genocide of so many Native American tribes and has left the church today with challenges that could have been avoided had we not attempted to “civilize” them them by force according to Western standards of culture.

History teaches us that Native Americans and First Nations people are a mis-reached and under reached people. Missiologists are recognizing them as a forgotten people. According to my limited studies and my own life experience, I agree.

There are people in Cherokee who have idea who Jesus is. I know, I have met them. I don’t need a statistic to prove it to me. Please pray for Native peoples. Ask the Lord what you could do. Help us reach our financial goals that we may plant a Reformed church in Cherokee. Pray that that church would raise up disciples and leaders to go throughout all the reservations and the world with the gospel. Please go to our Giving page to join our team of supporters.